Ag Food and Resource Economics Summer Experiences

Week 7

Week Seven of my internship I actually have been on vacation with my family in southern sunny California. That does not stop me from working and being responsive with Arbor Research and Trading. In other words I have the Arbor email set up on my phone and each day I have been here I have gotten over 35 emails and about half I am required to respond to. You would think you go on vacation with your family and you would have these days off, but no it still continues. I am not saying it is a bad thing at all because in the future when I am settled with a job and am on vacation it will be exactly like this. In a way it is a good thing and it is only further preparing me for the future. Also I had to communicate well with my boss on which email to actually respond to. With roughly 35 coming in each day it is hard for me as an intern to pick out what ones are worth responding to and he does a great job telling me what ones to write back to. What is good about that is it helps improve my communication skills and with a boss that responds as quickly as mine does it makes it so much easier on me. When responding to emails I looked exactly like my Dad because whenever we go on vacation he is always on his phone and never takes a day off. Usually I would get mad at him for not putting his phone away, but now I look exactly like him. He even commented on me responding to emails saying, “the job follows you everywhere you go”, which is so true and I now see it. Overall I wish I could have had a email free vacation, but that does not happen in the real world.